Location
During Tomee Sojourner's national speaker and workshop tour, a number of topics will be discussed, including:
• Intersectional diversity: Transforming workplace conversations to build sustainable change
• Oppresshun awareness: Moving beyond words into action
• Advocacy, activism, and social issues: Oppresshun awareness & intersectional diversity strategies
• Challenging stigma: "You have an M.A., so how can you have a learning disability?"
Tomee Sojourner is an inspirational, innovative, forward thinking, dynamic, engaging, professional and motivational speaker, management consultant, artist, diversity & inclusion strategies expert, and community/organizational change specialist. She has an M.A. in Social Justice and Equity Studies and a B.A. Honours in Directed Interdisciplinary Studies.
For over 14 years, Tomee has connected with thousands of people, through her speeches, presentations, courses, seminars, workshops, community-based initiatives, and visual art.
Audiences drawn to Tomee's work, live and work in different global spaces, including Montreal, Vancouver, England, Thailand, U.S., United Arab Emirates, and parts of Africa and the Caribbean.
Recently, Tomee has broadened her audience base through documentary filmmaking, and working with diverse groups of cultural workers (e.g. actors, theatre writers, dub poets, singers, musicans, and artists).
As a professional and motivational speaker, Tomee uses an engaging blend of personal insights, storytelling, academic knowledge, creative expression, research, and professional expertise to create informative and inspirational sessions for her audiences.
Tomee draws on her lived experiences, as a mixed-race, Black identified, lesbian, academic, thriving with a learning disability, to enhance the knowledge, expertise, and narratives she shares with her audiences. She also draws on her global journeys: Ottawa, Canada through the Democratic Republic of the Congo; Penang, Malaysia; Jeddah, Saudi Arabia; Kinloch Rannoch, Scotland; to Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
Through these journeys, Tomee has developed a unique and rare lens which she uses to 'understand' the complex landscapes of education, anti-oppression, intersectional diversity, inclusion, organizations, communitities, and people.
Tomee's speaking engagements and educational sessions create space for:
• Transformative conversations.
• Active learning and participation where the energy and experiences of audience members becomes an integral part of the collective learning journey.
• Handling difficult conversations and emotive responses.
• Developing creative practical solutions that move beyond the ‘cookie-cutter'/‘one-size fits all' approaches.
Participant Reflections:
"Your talk was an inspiration to me. It spoke directly to my experiences as a person with intersecting identities as a gay man of colour with a disability." Participant at the 3rd Canadian Labour Congress Solidarity and Pride Conference.
"Tomee...your information and ideas were fresh, encouraging and a wake up call to celebrate equity and diversity in a more profound manner." S.W. Elementary teacher, ETFO's And Still We Rise Conference, Equity Workshop
"Fabulous job, Tomee. It was a great presentation and I learnt a great deal. Thank you." Brad C. Halton Regional Police Service, Tomee Sojourner's workshop, Introduction to Intersectional Diversity in the Workplace.
Partial Client List:
anitafrika! dub theatre, OPSEU, ETFO, Daily Bread Food Bank, Youth Challenge Fund, Second Harvest Food Bank, The Stop, Toronto Drop-in Network.
